New urbanists critique projects

More regional planning needed; developments are valuable as models. Leading new urbanists gathered in Charleston this spring for the first organized attempt to critique new urbanist built work. Designers and developers presented eight projects, most of them well known, and all with substantial portions built. Only greenfield developments were presented (another meeting is planned to examine new urbanist infill work). The projects up for scrutiny were King Farm (Rockville, Maryland); Kentlands (Gaithersburg, Maryland); Celebration (Osceola County, Florida); Karow Nord (Berlin, Germany); Haile Village Center (Gainesville, Florida); Southlake Town Center (Fort Worth, Texas); Civano (Tucson, Arizona); and I’On (Mount Pleasant, South Carolina). The format consisted of a detailed presentation followed by a critique from a selected jury. The entire group — an invited crowd of just over 100 architects, planners, developers, engineers, and other professionals — then joined the discourse. The often heated discussions centered on the details and dilemmas of real projects: How are public spaces formed and streets deflected? How well do the edges of a project connect with, or encourage, surrounding urbanism? Was the town center placed correctly? How does an individual feel walking down a particular street? How is the architecture controlled or directed? Answers to such questions helped further the art and craft of the participating new urbanists and took the pulse of the movement as a whole. The conference illuminated the progress of the New Urbanism, but also exposed fault lines and weaknesses. Projects under discussion are among the best that the New Urbanism has produced, yet the designers were often critical of their own work. “Every day we pray for rain, so that the trees will grow,” observed Rob Goodill of Torti Gallas/CHK when describing the architectural shortcomings of production built dwellings in King Farm. “Everybody is looking for the perfect project,” said David Schwarz, designer of Southlake. “The best they can be is mediocre. I strive for a very high level of mediocrity.” Schwarz explained that only the patina of age can make a project great. During the Kentlands critique, Neil Payton of Torti Gallas/CHK identified one of the key issues facing new urbanists. Kentlands, like all of the projects presented, achieves substantial success when looked at internally. It has a mixture of uses and housing types, includes quality public spaces, and features pedestrian-friendly design that reduces the need for automobiles. But Kentlands is an “isolated piece,” according to Payton, surrounded by arterial roads and single-use developments. “This leads to a critique which is not entirely unfounded — that Kentlands is a better form of sprawl,” he said. “At the same time, there are some extraordinarily poetic moments in Kentlands.” All the projects, with the notable exception of Karow Nord in Germany, are surrounded by what traffic engineer Rick Hall described as “wounds” of sprawl. Hall suggested that arterial roads must be humanized — i.e. converted to boulevards and avenues fronted by buildings — before new urbanist projects coalesce into real towns. Until then, Hall said, the projects are like “endangered species kept alive in zoos.” Participants stated that the isolation of projects stems from failures of the political process, over which individual designers and developers have little control. “Why do we do such a horrible job, as new urbanists, of connecting to surrounding areas?” asked architect Andres Duany. “It’s not that we are unwilling to do it, it’s that the political process won’t let us do it.” Despite the difficulty of addressing this problem, new urbanists need to push harder for better regional planning, urged Shelley Poticha, Congress for the New Urbanism (CNU) executive director. “So many things are out of our control,” she said. “But think of all of the things that we have accomplished that were previously thought to be out of our control.” Despite lengthy discussions, little progress was made toward a resolution of the perennial conflict over traditional and modern architecture. A more fruitful exchange centered on architectural control mechanisms, a variety of which are used in the featured projects — including codes, guidelines, and pattern books. Two of the most well-received projects — Haile Village Center and Southlake — have essentially no written architectural codes, but the control over design is nevertheless firm. Southlake uses a handful of architects selected by the master designer, David Schwarz. In Haile Village Center, developer/architect Robert Kramer designed every building. No one criticized Haile and Southlake for their design approach, but Celebration’s pattern book was the subject of much debate. The pattern book includes six styles, distilled from a comprehensive study of buildings in the southeastern US. Such pattern books help make production building more efficient and increase affordability, but also have a negative impact “to the degree that they seem to shut down the possibility of another view and a plurality of voices,” argued Ellen Dunham-Jones, director of the architecture program at Georgia Tech. Ray Gindroz of Urban Design Associates, creator of the Celebration Pattern Book, noted that pattern books are not legal documents, but rather tools for builders. “I don’t see pattern books limiting options — to use one or not is a decision of the developer.” Architect Andres Duany argued that many methods are valid for directing building design. “We should have all models available to us, and not be internally ideological,” he said. “One should not be against pattern books. We need pattern books. But Gindroz should have other arrows in his quiver.” Ninety-eight percent of homes are not designed by architects, architect Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk pointed out. Guidelines, pattern books, and codes are methods of dealing with that 98 percent, she explained. “It would help us to elucidate the relationship between these methods, and determine which are effective in various circumstances,” she said. Zoning codes were identified as a major issue, but one around which new urbanists can unite. Many of the presented projects required creative strategies for securing entitlement, and underlying statutes remain a significant barrier nationwide. “It’s still illegal to build this kind of project in Alachua County,” said Kramer of Haile Village Center. Changing zoning codes is a top priority for CNU, stated board chair Stefanos Polyzoides. Participants agreed that the presented projects may make their greatest contribution as models for better development. Duany noted that former HUD secretary Henry Cisneros went to Kentlands, loved it, and consequently adopted new urbanist standards for federal public housing. Haile Village Center has helped bring about a paradigm shift in planning in Alachua County, Kramer said, and zoning codes there are being overhauled. King Farm is positively influencing surrounding developments. “What we are seeing in Kentlands, King Farm, and Haile Village Center is the impact of a really beautiful project on a region,” Gindroz said. “Once a place has been created, it has extraordinary power.” According to many participants, the Charleston meeting was the best discussion on New Urbanism since the first Congress for the New Urbanism in Alexandria, Virginia, in 1993. “We have matched the spirit of Alexandria in the last two days — it is now alive again,” said Polyzoides. The following are summaries of discussion on individual projects: King Farm King Farm, a 3,200-unit, 440-acre development, is a “very, very successful new town” from a financial perspective, according to architect John Torti. Ninety-five percent of the residential land was sold within five years, he says. A town center with 125,000 square feet of retail and two office buildings have also been completed. The reasons for success were threefold: “a fantastic location, a great economy, and King Farm was done by production builders,” Torti said. The latter also represented “one of the greatest difficulties” for the project, Torti added. Both single family and multifamily buildings suffer from a lack of attention to architectural details, too much vinyl siding installed to production-built standards, and, especially with the multifamily, “suburban typologies forced into an urban layout,” he said. The project achieves many of the goals of the Charter of the New Urbanism, jurors and participants agreed. The project is located very close to a District of Columbia Metro station, and may get a light rail line running through the town center. Thanks to Montgomery County regulations, King Farm will have 15 to 20 percent affordable housing units. The employment district will create 10,000 jobs (three times the number of dwelling units). King Farm has small, walkable blocks, and a very high density for its suburban location. “Hopefully King Farm will prove that urban design is more important than architecture,” Torti said. Kentlands The 343-acre, 1,700-unit project began construction in 1990 and is nearing completion. Kentlands is one of the first traditional neighborhood developments and a highly influential example of the New Urbanism. Kentlands has a lot of imperfections — but this is part of its charm. Some of the imperfections were deliberate, according to architect Andres Duany. A series of designers was asked to sequentially plan the Old Farm district (one of Kentlands’ best loved areas). This makes the plan less perfect, but more resilient, Duany explained, adding “it has a wonderful organic quality.” Other imperfections resulted from the relative inexperience of the designers (Kentlands was one of Duany Plater-Zyberk’s earliest projects), and the numerous plan changes due to environmental issues. Because of wetlands and topography, parts of the plan are highly discontinuous. Paul Murrain, a juror, criticized traffic patterns through the town center, pointing out that it is not built where traffic is heaviest. Duany agreed, stating that the plan could have been better designed “to bring the energy to main street.” In closing, Duany noted that “the best thing you can say about Kentlands is that it really looks like a real place.” Celebration The biggest and best known new urbanist project to date, Celebration was the only project presented that included a completed town center surrounded by a neighborhood with diverse housing types. The 5,000-acre site consists of a patchwork of wetlands and developable land, according to architects Brian Shea and Paul Whalen, both of whom were closely involved in the master planning. An expressway bisects the property, separating much of the new town from adjacent developed areas, including a major commercial arterial (Route 192). These physical constraints resulted in a disconnected development pattern, even within Celebration. The discontinuity was the subject of some criticism: especially the decision to separate the office park and medical facility north of the expressway, while the main part of town is on the southern side. Celebration’s mixed-use center, on the other hand, could have benefited from connection to Route 192, but instead was integrated with the town’s primary residential neighborhood, on the southern side of the highway. The lack of connections means that many trips in Celebration will have to be made by automobile. Nevertheless, Whalen noted that car use is reduced in Celebration (a contention which is supported by an independent survey), largely because of good connections between homes, civic buildings, and shops. It was also noted that Celebration has many well thought out details, such as the passageways between the downtown parking lots and retail streets. “It’s a remarkable place, especially considering it was built by a large corporation,” noted Vince Graham, a developer who served on the Celebration jury. “It’s not easy to create character.” Celebration is being developed by Disney Corp. Karow Nord The only project outside the US, Karow Nord extends a German town by adding shops, civic buildings, and 5,000 multifamily residential units. Presented by architect John Ruble, Karow is denser and more formal than the other seven critiqued developments. The rowhouses, courtyard units, urban villas, and perimeter block buildings are designed to be affordable and yet maintain a high level of quality in construction and design. “The architecture of this project is extraordinary, on a scale beyond what we can hope for here [in the US],” noted Polyzoides. It was stated that Karow resembles 19th Century European urbanism in its uniformity of architecture and formality. Some criticized the plan for too much uniformity. “This plan is a relief from American style single family — but it needs another overlay of playing with setbacks and shapes of streets,” commented architect Galina Tahchieva, a juror. Haile Village Center Haile Village Center, a new town center for a master planned development, received nearly unequivocal praise from the jurors. The project consists of a five-block long main street fronted by stand-alone, mixed-use buildings and centered on a square. Residential blocks branch off the main street. Jurors noted how carefully the streets are designed, with intersections deliberately misaligned to create vistas and calm traffic. Criticisms focused on the project’s location (far from the city), and the fact that the main street is hard to find. Although sited at the intersection of two primary roads, the village center commercial establishments were forbidden to front those roads. “Except if we did a shopping center, then they would allow that,” said architect and developer Robert Kramer. Southlake Town Square A 140-acre town center with a planned 3.2 million square feet of retail, offices, apartments, and civic buildings, Southlake drew praise for its carefully detailed traditional architecture. Southlake is in the middle of conventional suburban development north of Fort Worth, but has become a destination for suburban residents seeking an urban experience, according to architect Schwarz. This destination quality has contributed to the success of merchants. Southlake has been under construction for two years, and now includes 17 national retailers, six of whom have their highest sales per square foot in the nation, he says. Schwarz did not call his work New Urbanism. The design of Southlake adheres to two broad values, rather than specific new urbanist principles, he explained. The first value is building on a pedestrian scale. The second is using architecture to promote community. “Architecture can either divide, or bring people together,” he said. “We disguise differences. We don’t accentuate them.” Southlake lacks diversity in scale — there is a consistent density from center to edge — and like many of the other projects is isolated in sprawl. Schwarz described Southlake as a fragment of urbanism, “but we don’t view that as a bad thing — the question is how you impact the fragment next to you.” Civano This 820-acre development is designed to combine new urbanist principles with sustainability in a way that is economically viable. The latter has been a struggle, according to Lee Rayburn, director of design and planning for the project. The first year, 1999, was excellent in terms of sales. But 2000 was a “horrible year” due to the bankruptcy of one of the major builders. “But we’re back, and selling homes at a good pace.” Although the homes in Civano meet high efficiency standards, the environmental goals are undermined by civil engineering requirements, which resulted in overly wide streets and the clearing of the entire site, according to Duany. The native plants were carefully saved and replanted at cost of $1.5 million. A better approach would have been to simply leave most of the natural vegetation undisturbed, he said. Civano received a lot of praise for its use of vernacular courtyard typologies, both for homes and in the town center. The shaded courtyard in the neighborhood center is designed with a natural cooling tower that cuts summer temperatures by 20 degrees, according to architect Stefanos Polyzoides. “It’s a beautiful study of typologies,” commented architect Murrain. I’On A development of high architectural quality, I’On has been undermined in the entitlement process. Developer Vince Graham noted that multifamily buildings, carriage homes, and connections to surrounding developments were sacrificed to gain approvals. “We hope to get some of these elements back over time,” he said. The 243-acre, 850-unit project with a small town center has narrow, frequently deflected streets to calm traffic and add architectural interest. The plan was criticized by some jurors for lacking a clear neighborhood structure and its excessive “crankiness,” i.e., having streets that meander and deflect too much. Designer Victor Dover noted “there were changes made to the plan to respond to topography that increased its crankiness.” I’On is bounded on one side by a highly traveled artery, Mathis Ferry Road. The developers and designers originally planned to front buildings on Mathis Ferry in an attempt to urbanize it. Although this was disallowed, they were given permission to install a small traffic circle — the first in South Carolina. Of all the projects presented, I’On was the only one to successfully change the character — even if only a little — of a bordering traffic artery.